Nightmares Film Festival Debuts ‘The Black Room’ & More (Exclusive)

Being someone who resides in a smaller state lacking any major cities, I’ve never attended a horror film festival before. Such events often aren’t cheap and when you don’t have one playing close by, travel expenses can further complicate things. I can only assume many of you are in the same boat. For some of you, however, Nightmares Film Festival could change that!

While Columbus, Ohio isn’t right next door to me, it’s a hell of a lot closer than most other horror film festival locations and that makes me smile. Nightmares Film Festival will be running at Columbus’ Gateway Film Center in just under a month’s time, stretching from Thursday, October 20th to Sunday, October 23rd and the folks behind it have been kind enough to share some exclusive information about some of the films set to premiere at the festival…

Exclusive: Nightmares Film Festival Announces World Premieres

“ABCs of Death 2.5” leads stacked slate of debuts in first wave of selections

(COLUMBUS, OH) With its first wave of selections – all premieres – the inaugural Nightmares Film Festival (Oct. 20 to 23) is making good on its promise to deliver a prestige fest with a “worldwide lineup of better horror.”

The Columbus, Ohio-based festival began announcing selections this week, starting with its opening night film: the world’s first and only theatrical screening of ABCs of Death 2.5. The film – which collects the best entries in the “M is For” contest that was run for ABCs of Death 2, and has to date only been available as a Vimeo rental – is a funny, scary, shocking sneak peek at some of the best up-and-coming voices in horror filmmaking.

NFF programmer and co-founder Jason Tostevin said the ABCs of Death 2.5 screening will include a live introduction and Q&A with “M is For” winner Robert Boocheck, who will screen his ABCs of Death 2 winning entry, M is for Masticate.

The festival also announced it will host the world premiere of writer/director Tommy Faircloth’s (Doll Face, Crinoline Head, The Cabin) anticipated new horror feature Family Possessions, starring Jason Vail (Abraham Lincoln Vs. Zombies), Mark Patton (Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge), Felissa Rose (Sleepaway Camp) and Leah Wiseman (Dollface) on Friday, October 21. Family Possessions is about a young girl who inherits the mansion of her estranged grandmother, only to discover a long-buried and terrifying family secret.

First is supernatural horror feature The Black Room, written and directed by Rolfe Kanefsky and starring Natasha Henstridge (Species) and Lukas Hassel (Law and Order: Criminal Intent), which will make its world premiere at NFF. The Black Room is the story of a couple (Henstridge and Hassel) whose dream home turns out to have a terrifying presence in its walls, and a nightmare in the basement’s Black Room.

Second is the insane Spanish horror-comedy feature The Night of the Virgin, which will make its North American premiere at the festival. Night follows an awkward guy on New Year’s Eve who’s looking to get lucky, but instead gets a body-fluid-soaked evening in crazytown.

Both films are currently scheduled to make their debuts on Saturday, Oct. 23.

“We are so thrilled at the strength of the Nightmares program. It’s absolutely packed with can’t-miss shorts and features, top to bottom,” said Tostevin. “To us, that reflects both the worldwide talent working in genre, and the way the horror community comes together to support its fests and fans.”

The festival will announce its Ohio premieres later this week, and will then notify all filmmakers of their selection status before Sept. 25.

Sounds great to me! A couple of these films were already on my “to watch” list and I’m interested in seeing what other projects are announced to play at the fest. While I haven’t seen any of them yet myself, I can certainly attest to Gateway Film Center being a great venue for such an event. I was lucky enough to catch Baskin there a few months back and their overall programming (both horror and non-horror) is generally fantastic to the point where I wish I owned a teleportation device. If you live in the surrounding area, I suggest making a trip to both this festival and the theater in general.